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    Electra
    Electra
    Electra
    Ebook64 pages1 hour

    Electra

    By Sophocles

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    One of the lesser known plays of the Greek tragedian Sophocles, "Electra" tells the tale of a young daughter's revenge for her father's death. Electra is one of the daughters of Agamemnon, the leader of the Greeks during the Trojan War. He was killed by his wife's lover, and Electra wishes to avenge Agamemnon with the help of her twin brother Orestes. When she receives word that he is dead, Electra laments and fears she will not be able to avenge her father. When the man delivering her brother's ashes arrives, however, secrets are uncovered and Agamemnon's killers feel the full weight of the grieving children's revenge.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDigireads.com Publishing
    Release dateJan 1, 2010
    ISBN9781420936667
    Author

    Sophocles

    Sophocles is one of three ancient Greek tragedians whose plays have survived. His first plays were written later than or contemporary with those of Aeschylus, and earlier than or contemporary with those of Euripides.

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      Book preview

      Electra - Sophocles

      ELECTRA

      BY SOPHOCLES

      TRANSLATED BY LEWIS CAMPBELL

      A Digireads.com Book

      Digireads.com Publishing

      Print ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-3312-3

      Ebook ISBN 13: 978-1-4209-3666-7

      This edition copyright © 2012

      Please visit www.digireads.com

      CONTENTS

      THE PERSONS

      ELECTRA

      ELECTRA

      THE PERSONS

      AN OLD MAN, formerly one of the retainers of Agamemnon

      ORESTES, son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra

      ELECTRA, sister of Orestes

      CHORUS of Argive Women

      CHRYSOTHEMIS, sister of Orestes and Electra

      CLYTEMNESTRA

      AEGISTHUS

      PYLADES appears with ORESTES, but does not speak.

      SCENE. Mycenae: before the palace of the Pelopidae.

      Agamemnon on his return from Troy, had been murdered by his wife Clytemnestra and her paramour Aegisthus, who had usurped the Mycenean throne. Orestes, then a child, had been rescued by his sister Electra, and sent into Phocis with the one servant who remained faithful to his old master. The son of Agamemnon now returns, being of a full age, accompanied by this same attendant and his friend Pylades, with whom he has already concerted a plan for taking vengeance on his father's murderers, in obedience to the command of Apollo.

      Orestes had been received in Phocis by Strophius, his father's friend. Another Phocian prince, named Phanoteus, was a friend of Aegisthus.

      ELECTRA

      [ORESTES and the OLD MAN—PYLADES is present]

      OLD MAN. Son of the king who led the Achaean host

      Erewhile beleaguering Troy, 'tis thine to day

      To see around thee what through many a year

      Thy forward spirit hath sighed for. Argolis

      Lies here before us, hallowed as the scene

      Of Io's wildering pain: yonder, the mart

      Named from the wolf-slaying God,{1} and there, to our left,

      Hera's famed temple. For we reach the bourn

      Of far renowned Mycenae, rich in gold

      And Pelops' fatal roofs before us rise,

      Haunted with many horrors, whence my hand,

      Thy murdered sire then lying in his gore,

      Received thee from thy sister, and removed

      Where I have kept thee safe and nourished thee

      To this bright manhood thou dost bear, to be

      The avenger of thy father's bloody death.

      Wherefore, Orestes, and thou, Pylades,

      Dearest of friends, though from a foreign soil,

      Prepare your enterprise with speed. Dark night

      Is vanished with her stars, and day's bright orb

      Hath waked the birds of morn into full song.

      Now, then, ere foot of man go forth, ye two

      Knit counsels. 'Tis no time for shy delay:

      The very moment for your act is come.

      ORESTES. Kind faithful friend, how well thou mak'st appear

      Thy constancy in service to our house!

      As some good steed, aged, but nobly bred,

      Slacks not his spirit in the day of war,

      But points his ears to the fray, even so dost thou

      Press on and urge thy master in the van.

      Hear, then, our purpose, and if aught thy mind,

      Keenly attent, discerns of weak or crude

      In this I now set forth, admonish me.

      I, when I visited the Pythian shrine

      Oracular, that I might learn whereby

      To punish home the murderers of my sire,

      Had word from Phoebus which you straight shall hear:

      'No shielded host, but thine own craft, O King!

      The righteous death-blow to thine arm shall bring.'

      Then, since the will of Heaven is so revealed,

      Go thou within, when Opportunity

      Shall marshal thee the way, and gathering all

      Their business, bring us certain cognizance.

      Age and long absence are a safe disguise;

      They never will suspect thee who thou art.

      And let thy tale be that another land,

      Phocis, hath sent thee forth, and Phanoteus,

      Than whom they have no mightier help in war.

      Then, prefaced with an oath, declare thy news,

      Orestes' death by dire mischance, down-rolled

      From wheel-borne chariot in the Pythian course.

      So let the fable be devised; while we,

      As Phoebus ordered, with luxuriant locks

      Shorn from our brows, and fair libations, crown

      My father's

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